This invention deals with small "toy" balloons, as opposed to weather balloons or aeronautical balloons which carry a basket or gondola. These toy balloons are used for festive occasions, as children's toys, advertising media, special occasion bouquets with messages such as "Happy Birthday," "Happy Valentine's Day," etc. In recent years creative and artistic usages have included large-scale decorations and sculptures for banquets, dances, etc. The balloon manufacturer faces a number of problems with respect to the production of balloons. There are two types of balloons used for these purposes, latex and "Mylar" balloons. Mylar is a trademark of the DuPont Company, and such Mylar balloons are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,077,588. The use of Mylar in balloons has its own problems, and latex balloons remain the balloon of choice for many situations. Latex balloons are relatively easy and inexpensive to manufacture and can readily be imprinted with designs and lettering. However, latex balloons usually do not have a long life span in that, when produced, the exterior surface of the balloon has a shiny, glossy finish which is considered to be desirable. However, after the balloon is inflated, and particularly after being exposed to UV light and gases present in the air, the surface of the balloon tends to fog or bloom and becomes dull. This dulling of the surface layer is thought to result from oxidation or ozonation of the latex and results in an unattractive dulling of the surface finish and may lead to a long-term increase in the porosity of the latex membrane so that the balloon tends to more quickly lose its internal gas pressure and reach equilibrium with the ambient pressure. This dulling of the surface texture has been noticed to commence within a mere few hours after inflation and is readily apparent to any person, regardless of particular skill in the art, who has picked up his or her child's toy balloon after it is has been inflated for several days and noticed the dull and lusterless appearance.
Attempts have been made to increase the life span of the balloon by applying a protective coating to an inflated balloon through a spraying process. A recent patent directed to this subject but using a different process than that disclosed herein is U.S. Pat. No. 4,634,395 to Donald Burchett for INFLATABLE ELASTOMERIC BALLOONS HAVING INCREASED BUOYANT LIFETIMES. The Burchett Patent provides additional explanation and a history of elastomeric balloons.